1. Field
The following description relates to a universal plug and play (UPnP) middleware-based home network.
2. Description of the Related Art
Due to the spread of home networking, conventional home networking environments centering on personal computers (PCs) are gradually shifting to home networking environments including electronic equipments using various lower networking technologies. As a result, home network middleware technologies such as universal plug and play (UPnP) are being developed to group such electronic equipments in a unified network by using Internet protocols (IPs).
UPnP technology enables home appliances in a home network to be peer-to-peer networked on the basis of a distributed and open networking structure instead of being under centralized control.
Generally, in home network middleware, a UPnP device models its service with actions and state variables. A UPnP control point (CP) automatically discovers the UPnP device to use the service.
UPnP Device Architecture 1.0, for example, uses distributed and open networking to discover a UPnP device via an IP multicast in a home network. It cannot currently be guaranteed that an IP multicast service is provided across the Internet, and thus controlling the UPnP device using information obtained from the discovery of the UPnP device may be difficult to perform across the Internet.
As a result, UPnP Remote Access Architecture has been developed such that a UPnP device or a CP is operated in a home network as if they exist in the same network even if the UPnP device or the CP physically exists outside the home network. The UPnP Remote Access Architecture defines a remote access server (RAS) existing within a home network and a remote access client (RAC) existing in a remote network.